


Meet Qte

by silveradept



Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-22
Updated: 2016-05-22
Packaged: 2018-06-10 02:12:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6933871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silveradept/pseuds/silveradept
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The newest Dixon Hill holonovel beckons to its greatest fan. Unfortunately, much like the stories of his favorite detective, things go strange fast for Picard.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Meet Qte

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DoreyG](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoreyG/gifts).



Dixon Hill entered the club, sharply dressed in a white tuxedo with black bow tie. He'd tracked the man that had betrayed him to this location, where rumor had it that he would be dining, before reporting to his superiors somewhere else. If Hill was lucky, the man that had paid him for the betrayal would be present as well, which would make for some very satisfying revenge.

Before the business of the evening was to begin, however, there was to be drinking, and dancing, and even a little bit of flirting, since there was always time for advancing one of his many relationships with the women of the city. He had a reputation in this place as being the best at what he did, and that meant spending time to maintain it.

As soon as he was shown to his table, he knew which woman he would be dancing with tonight. She had a lot of leg showing underneath a dress that teased a lot but never told. Her brown hair feel in gracious waves on top of the dress, completing the outfit and giving her similarly brown eyes a sparkle that Hill was sure was meant for him. Picking up his whiskey from the table, he went over to her and introduced himself.

She had a musical laugh that she put to good use while he charmed her with his dance steps. At the end of their first time on the dance floor, she looked into his eyes and purred at him.

"Jean-Luc, I never knew you learned how to foxtrot. I'm impressed."

"Computer, pause novel." The answering chime brought the action, the music, and the crowded club scene to a perfect stop, every detail captured and rendered, but completely motionless.

Jean-Luc Picard, captain of the United Federation of Planets flagship vessel, the _Enterprise_ , the fifth to bear the name in the history of the Federation, had been looking forward to this holonovel for years, ever since the estate of the author has authorized the production and release of what it called a "lost episode." The Federation was in a relatively peaceful era, which meant that his time was mostly spent supervising scientific efforts and mapping uncharted space. Unlike previous captains of the ship, Picard was considered too valuable by the Federation to be risked on potentially dangerous away missions. And after the Locutus affair, he had fought a protracted and bitter campaign against Starfleet Command just to get off the planet, much less back onto his ship. While the seemingly weekly crises helped keep his skills sharp and his adrenaline floating, the two-fisted detective holonovels of Dixon Hill were one of the few outlets he had for true adventure. And now he would have to report the adventure had issues and get engineering to the holodeck to make sure the computer wasn't malfunctioning.

The report would be pretty obvious as to what part was defective, at least, as his dance partner whirled out of his hands and came to a stop nearby.

"Oh, come on, Jean-Luc," she said, "can't a girl just have a dance with her favorite captain?"

Picard was fairly certain he hadn't had the holonovel personalized, so why the program was referring to him by his name was chalked up to the malfunction.

"Picard to Engineering," he said, hoping to raise the duty chief for the shift. When no response came, he repeated his request, also with no response.

"Really, Jean-Luc?" the woman said, in a distinctly deeper, more masculine, and much more familiar tone of voice. "You humans are so limited in your outlook. No wonder you create stories like this, full of cardboard characters and simple motivations. It's all your primitive brains can understand."

There were very few entities that Picard knew that would be both that familiar and that insulting to him in a single sentence. Thinking of the likely suspects, Picard noted Worf was not usually one for playing tricks like this. Worf was also _asleep_. Which meant it was most likely... 

"Q!" Picard had hoped it would come out as a controlled, commanding observation of the situation. Instead, what came out was years of frustration at Q's antics, mixed with the aggravation of the knowledge that he would not be getting back to his holonovel tonight. "What are your doing here? And why are you... dressed like that?"

"It's all for you, mon cap-i-tan." Q purred in what was an approximation of a sultry voice. "I've been curious about what makes you humans tick, ever since Amanda started regaling us with stories of her first crushes." Q pressed herself against Picard's uniform, giving him a view of very deep cleavage that was definitely not there a moment before.

Picard pushed Q away gruffly. "Surely you have somewhere else to sow discord than my ship?"

"Discord?" Q transformed himself into a creature with a horse head, dragon body, and what looked to be several different species' appendages. "I'm here to help you, Jean-Luc. Ever since you turned down all those perfectly good offers of jamaharon, you've been frustrated with everything."

Picard stared at him. "I don't want your 'help', Q. Especially not when you look like the remaining pieces in a child's toy chest."

"Well, I kind of like it. I think I'll go inspire someone to make a children's show about me." Q disappeared in a flash, and Picard relaxed a little. Hopefully that would be the last he saw of...

"Maybe if I looked and sounded like Doctor Crusher, you would be happier?" Q suggested, returning in a flash, having taken on the form and voice of Picard's on-again, off-again romantic partner. Picard turned away from Q, nearly shouting for the doorway off the holodeck, which materialized in place of the door to the club.

"Jean-Luc, I would have thought you were more open to possibilities than this. I knew a Time Lord who liked to change their gender presentation every other regeneration. They were always fun to play with." Q followed behind the captain, still looking and sounding like Beverly.

Picard stepped off the holodeck and went a few steps into the new environment before realizing that he was not, in fact, on his ship. Turning around, he saw Q, in the form he normally presented, wearing a Starfleet Command staff uniform, grinning like the Cheshire Cat.

"Tonight," Q said, rubbing his hands together with glee, "we're going to see what you think is sexy," before bounding off down the street in the direction of a large neon sign proclaiming "Girls!" in several different languages.

Picard tried to go in any direction other than the club, but no matter which alleyway he tried to go down, which street he tried to take instead, he always ended up closer to the garishly lit doorway. Sighing, he let Q lead him into the last place he wanted to be that night.

The inside of the bar was considerably more full than what Picard would have expected, with women wearing more clothes than what Q was expecting taking drink orders while a few slightly less-dressed women were swaying to a forgettable piece of music on stage.

"Hello there, boys," one of the servers said, coming up to them. Picard could see that she was clearly the inspiration for Q's bustier attempt at getting a rise out of him earlier. "We don't see many Federation types around here. Most of them are too stuffed-shirt to be seen here. Or they're Vulcans trying to practice emotional suppression. Lousy tippers, Vulcans."

"I assure you, my dear," Q told her, "my companion here has a shirt that is not only stuffed, but ironed and starched within an inch of its life. All the same, I'm hoping to give him a good time tonight. Perhaps even one with a fortuitous ending, if you know what I mean."

"Then you're in the wrong place," she said, all the warmth from her voice and her body language gone as fast as Q could physically transport himself. "Maybe you should try the speed dating event at _some other bar_. Quincy will be happy to show you the way." Turning away from them both, she put her smile back on for the other customers. "Who wears a tuxedo to a strip joint, anyway?" they heard as she walked off.

"A man who had other plans for the evening." Picard muttered, before preceding the imposing bouncer back out the front door. Q seemed undeterred at getting thrown out, heading swiftly down the sidewalk away from the brightly lit club and toward a much lower-key establishment, proclaiming proudly the variety of alcohol available. Picard noticed a small sandwich board outside advertising the previously mentioned speed dating night.

"Q, stop this," he said. "I have no intention of going through with this ridiculous scenario."

"You're just worried nobody will find you attractive, Jean-Luc. You, however, have _reserves_ of sexy to these people. Trust me." Before Picard could continue to object, he found himself inside the bar, holding a dating card and listening to the first woman introduce herself with a well-rehearsed speech. Each subsequent candidate gave him a variation on the same theme, and he dealt with all of them in the same way - saying only as much as necessary and trying to look as disinterested as possible. Q had disappeared for a little bit, no doubt scouting out whatever the next location would be for them after he pronounced this experiment a dismal failure.

A commotion from one of the other tables attracted his attention. One of the other women was struggling with a man determined to drag her out of the bar by whatever methods were necessary. Everyone near the couple seemed uninterested in the affair, despite the clear danger.

"Let her go," Picard said, stepping in front of the man and blocking his way.

"Move, old man," he replied. "This isn't your problem."

"You are taking her somewhere she does not want to go. You should release her."

"I don't gotta do nothing. Move, or I'll make you."

Picard instinctively felt for his phaser, but remembered that he'd left it behind when he changed into his Dixon Hill outfit. Of all the times to be without a weapon that could end things easily and painlessly!

"No. Let her go," Picard replied. The other man stared at him for a long while before thrusting the woman at him. "Here. You have her."

"Thank you for--"

Whatever the captain was going to say was lost in the need to avoid the haymaker that followed shortly after the woman being thrown at him. Sparring with a Klingon on a regular basis made Picard the better fighter, a fact that became clear to him after dodging another wild punch from his brutish opponent. A quick jab stopped the third attempted hit, and another the fourth. Realizing the fight could drag on for a long time if he didn't stop it quickly, Picard chose to block the next punch so that he could step in and deliver a one-two combination to the man's gut and solar plexus. Winded and staggering, the man was laid out quickly by Picard's left and followup right to his jaw.

Straightening his jacket, satisfied with the dispensation of two-fisted justice, Dixon Hill turned to the woman to see if she was okay. She threw her arms around him and planted a deep and passionate kiss on his lips. In response, he did what any proper private eye would do, giving back her passion in equal measure, embracing the adventure for what it was. After what had been only a minute, but seemed longer, they finally parted lips. She was a surprisingly good kisser, for someone that had only met him a few minutes before, and she had a mischievous twinkle in her eyes that suggested there might be more than just kissing in store for him tonight.

"I'd say that's better than a holonovel any day, wouldn't you, Jean-Luc?" she said, grinning at him.


End file.
